The Wind Was Grey
by Phinneas McCheeser
Summary: This is the perspective of an unnamed character after the Final Battle.  What would it take to make you leave the world of magic?  An experiment in the world of second person point-of-view.


**All right now, just to clarify: This takes place after the Final Battle, so there are obviously spoilers for book 7. This is also a little experiment in the second person. **

**Don't forget to review!**

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><p>You are standing on a small hill, with a view overlooking a castle you know well. You know it so well, you feel as if it's a part of you. There was a light rain this morning, but it's gone now. The sun is still hiding, however, unwilling to cast its cheery presence over a scene of such grief and mourning.<p>

The wind blows around you, trying to move you, but you stubbornly remain unmovable. The wind is grey, you think. You ask yourself how something like the wind can be a color, but there is no answer forthcoming. It just is.

The worst is gone, you think. But there is that small voice in the back of your head that tells you that the worst is yet to come. The worst will come when you enter the Great Hall, and see the bodies—some easily recognizable through the blood and grime, some completely disfigured, limbs twisted into odd, unnatural positions…

You shove those thoughts to the back of your mind. They are unnecessary at the moment.

You take a quick look around. You are completely alone. Everyone else is in the Hospital Wing, or in the Great Hall, figuring it best to do it sooner rather than later. But you have always been a procrastinator—whether it was turning in your History essays or seeing the dead, you have always waited until the moment when you cannot wait any longer. Only now, you feel like that will never happen.

For a moment, you briefly toy with the idea of running for it. Into the forest, then out into Hogsmeade, and you could Apparate to… Someplace. Someplace where nobody could find you. Someplace where the grief couldn't find you.

You shake the idea from your head. Running away never solved anything. Your mother ran away when your father died, and she passed away from grief. And the rest of your family will be in the Great Hall—though dead or alive, you don't know.

You feel a burning desire to go and see. To see whether they are alive or not. Not that you care, you think quickly. You weren't close to them.

The grey wind tugs at you, ordering you to move. You do not. You can almost feel the anger of the currents, pulling at you, doing everything in its power to force you away.

You still do not move.

In a strange way, you think, you are grieving. For all of them. All of the fathers and mothers, sisters and brothers, cousins and friends and family—all the ones that would never make it home.

A loud, keening wail sounds from the castle. Not unusual. You blink snowflakes from your eyelashes. _Snowflakes. _It is May. You do not stop to think about how strange this is. You do not consider the possibility of magic. You do not think. You merely look.

The view is the same. The castle walls. Wet. Dull. The trees. Barren. Empty. The long, grey grasses, forever swaying in the long, grey wind.

Your hands are growing numb in the cold. The wind—the grey wind—cuts you like a knife, right to the bone. You have no coat, no gloves. You make no move to warm yourself. Your wand lies untouched in your inner pocket - it might as well have been smashed against the ground in the fight.

All you want to do is stay here forever. Turn into a statue, all cut and polished stone, then fade away with the winds and storms of life. Because stone can't feel.

But you can.

You know that your procrastination has gone on long enough. You need to go into the castle. You have to think of where to begin.

Slowly, you place one foot in front of the other. It takes effort. You repeat the action. The wind, sensing your surrender, blows in particularly strong gusts, pushing you off the hill faster than you would have made it on your own.

You suppose you should thank it.

You don't.

The castle doors are in front of you much too soon. Hardwood and iron, they seem to stretch up for miles. They are open.

You enter and awkwardly make your way over to the Great Hall. Awkwardly because you have to step over bodies and grieving people. Awkwardly because the blood is everywhere.

You enter the Great Hall and mill around for a few moments. You miss the familiar icy comfort of the grey winds and the long grasses. The winds and grasses could not _feel_.

You know there is a body you should be looking for. But you can't make yourself look. Instead, you walk around.

Finally you find her.

In a secluded corner all to herself. There are no bodies near her. Her unseeing eyes stare at the ceiling. With nothing better to do, you follow her gaze and meet rough, aged stone.

You can't bring yourself to feel upset. She was your family. But you never really cared for her. And so you don't.

You look around; take in the scenes of grief and betrayal, the stench of blood and misery thick in the air.

You want to leave.

Not just now—you want to leave for good.

Unthinkingly, your pale hand pulls out your wand. It snaps in two as your fingers bend it. You toss the halves down on the ground. No one sees you.

You turn around before you have a chance to think of the life you just threw away. But even if you had thought, you wouldn't have cared. The war left you uncaring.

You are back outside. You steer far away from the tiny hill in the middle of the grounds. Long bits of grass sway at your feet. The grey wind whips through your hair as you enter into the Forbidden Forest.

There are no animals. No strange creatures lurking in dark corners. And so you continue on, unburdened. You reach the edge of the woods in due time, but you don't come out at Hogsmeade. Rather, you are at the school gates.

Perhaps it's for the best, you think. It is, after all, pointless to attempt Apparation without a wand.

And so you head for the gates.

When you pass through them, you don't look back. The life you left behind is worthless.

The grey wind whispers behind you. It's a sad sort of whisper, a farewell. You can't help but feel betrayed. You thought it would never feel, just like you. Just as soon as it began, the feeling stopped.

Any other person would have thought that the gates closed on their own. But you know differently. You can almost feel the wind pushing them closed. The grey wind. You ask yourself how something like the wind can have a color, but deep down you know that it just is.

The gates finally close behind you and the grey wind shoves you forwards slightly, towards the Muggle world. You take one small step, then two. It gets easier after two.

You suppose you should thank the wind.

You don't.

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><p><strong>Well, how did you like it? Please review, and thanks for reading!<strong>

_Word count: 1187_


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